Four injured in mass shooting outside Tallahassee apartment complex on Ocala Road
An overnight party outside an apartment complex became the scene of Tallahassee's first mass shooting of 2023.
The latest round in a string of summer shootings began when a fight broke out between two groups and bullets began to fly, injuring four people -- a man, two women and a teenager -- outside the Acasa Ocala Apartments at 1303 Ocala Road.
"There was a party, an argument ensued and shots were fired," a Tallahassee Police Department watch commander told the Tallahassee Democrat at about 4:45 a.m.
He said the injuries are non-life threatening and those who were shot were taken to the hospital.
"Throughout the course of the investigation, officers learned the two males who were shot had outstanding warrants for their arrest, and have subsequently been taken into custody," a TPD spokesperson wrote in an incident alert.
After working a crime scene hours earlier in which a woman was shot in a barrage of gunfire, Tallahassee Police Department officers were called to the apartment complex at about 11:30 p.m. Friday.
As officers investigated, they were pelted with heavy rain from a heavy storm overnight.
"It made it very difficult," the watch commander said. "A lot of witness left. We're still trying to figure out what happened."
Shooting comes after city hit with two mass shootings in 2022
THE USA TODAY NETWORK and Tallahassee Democrat define a mass shooting as an incident in which at least four people are hit with gunfire, even if there are no fatalities.
The Ocala street shooting is the third mass shooting in the last year.
In late 2022, the city saw two mass shootings about a month apart, which inflicted fatal injuries on two innocent bystanders and injured a dozen others.
The first took place on West Pensacola Street when a gun battle began in a crowd of revelers. The second occurred at the outdoor basketball courts at Florida A&M University's Student Recreation Center when a man approached the court and began firing.
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A history of shootings at the apartments at 1303 Ocala Road
Friday night's shooting at the apartment complex that markets itself as "only a few minutes from Florida State University" is not the first at that address.
Previously called The Hub Tallahassee apartments, police responded to a fight that led to a shooting in April 2022. Two people were injured and five cars were hit by gunfire. A video that circulated on social media after the incident showed a car speeding through the complex before a crash could be heard. The 13 second video picks up the loud crack of at least 10 gunshots.
In November 2021, police found a man who was shot in the parking lot of the apartment complex and endured non-life threatening injuries.
In 2019, a 19-year old was shot and killed and a 17-year-old girl suffered serious gunshot injuries after police say a drug deal ended in violence.
A bloody summer in Tallahassee
Friday night's shooting is part of a summer spike in violence. Since June, the city has endured three separate double homicides and three murders in a single 24-hour span – and now a mass shooting.
This year, 16 people have died – eleven of them since June – and at least 48 have been injured in 60 serious shootings in the capital city and county, according to a Tallahassee Democrat analysis of gun violence.
The Ocala Street shooting was the third shooting incident this week and came hours after police responded to the Leon Arms Apartments on Holton Street where a woman endured life-threatening injuries from a hail of gunfire outside the complex.
On Tuesday night, two 18-year-olds were killed in a shooting outside the Lawrence-Gregory Community Center on Dade Street. According to police both men were shot inside a car. One died at the scene, the other at a local hospital. No arrests have been made.
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story had the incorrect year for the last two mass shootings in Tallahassee.
Editor William Hatfield can be reach at whatfield@tallahassee.com.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Tallahassee mass shooting outside Acasa Ocala Apartments
